5 Ways to Fix Google Chrome Sync Issues

Google Chrome has established itself as a leading browser worldwide. The success is due to its speed, flexibility, and many other features that allow users to enjoy a great browsing experience. One of the top Chrome features is Chrome Sync. This Chrome Sync feature allows users to backup their browsing data such as browsing history, bookmarks and passwords and use across multiple devices. However, you may experience some annoying Chrome Sync errors, which prevent Sync from working properly. In this article we will explore various ways of resolving common Chrome Sync issues.

Some Common Chrome Sync Problems

You may encounter various issues when trying to synchronize the browser data in Chrome. Some of these issues include:

• Sync not working – The sync features fails to work on your PC or Mac completely.
• Bookmark not syncing/ not working – The feature can synchronize other data but fails to sync your bookmarks.
• Passwords, open tabs and extensions not syncing – Some users have reported issues when syncing passwords, extensions and open tabs.
• Admin disabled Chrome sync – Sync failure due to administrator’s settings.
• Persistent Chrome sync error – A sync error that constantly reoccurs whenever you try to synchronize your data in Chrome browser.

Solution 1: Disable your Antivirus Temporarily

Antivirus is a must-have tool to ensure your computer is safe from malicious attacks that can compromise the integrity of your data or system. However, some antivirus features may interfere with the Chrome Sync feature and result in synchronization problems. You can disable your Antivirus software and check whether Sync will work.

If you are using a Windows 10 PC, you may have to disable Windows Defender.

• Click the Windows Start button, type “Defender” in the search box and open the Windows Defender settings.
• On the Windows Security tab, select “Virus & threat protection” under the “Protection areas” section.

• On the resulting Windows Security Centre, click the “Virus & threat protection settings” link.

• Switch off the “Real-time protection” to disable the antivirus temporarily.

• Check whether the Chrome Sync issue has been resolved. If not, you may need to check and disable any other third-party antivirus suit.
• For the best result, you can uninstall the antivirus and install again later.

On Mac, disable any antivirus software if you have installed from third-party.

Solution 2: Turn Chrome Sync Feature Off / Sign Out Your Account

You can turn off the Sync feature in Chrome and turn it on again to resolve some of the above issues. This will sign you out of the Google account, and then you can sign in to start sync afresh.

• Use the URL, “chrome://settings/” to open the settings page.
• Under the “People” section, click the “Turn off” button to disable sync.

• Click “Turn off” on the resulting pop-up to confirm. You may check the box at the bottom of the pop-up window to clear all the synchronized data.

• To enable sync, click “Turn on Sync…” under the “People” section.
• Enter your Gmail credentials to login. Chrome will prompt you to confirm whether you want to turn on Sync; click “Turn on” to continue.

Now, check the sync feature is working.

Solution 3: Reset Chrome Sync

When you sync, Google stores the data on cloud server. You can also set passphrase to encrypt your data so that Google can’t read. You can reset sync and passphrase and then turn on the feature to start synchronizing your data again.

• Type the URL, “chrome://settings/syncSetup” to open advanced sync settings.
• Select “Manage synced data on Google Dashboard” to your Sync Google dashboard.

• This will open the sync data in a new tab. Scroll down the page and at the bottom click “Reset Sync”.

• Click “Ok” to start the process and follow the reset wizard to complete.

• Once done, sign in back to Chrome to start syncing your data from scratch.

Remember, resetting sync will delete the data on the server. However, the data on your local device will remain untouched. So you can re-sync your local data again to the server.

Solution 4: Clear the Browser Cache

Google Chrome keeps a cache of your visited sites to minimize the loading time whenever you visit the websites later. Sometimes cleaning the browser cache can resolve the sync error.

• Open “chrome://settings” page, scroll down and click on “Advanced” option.
• Again scroll down to the bottom of the “Privacy & security” settings and click “Clear browsing data”.
• On the new pop-up switch to the “Advanced” tab and set “All time” on the time range field.
• Check the browsing / download history, cookies, cached images and files options and click “Clear data” button.

This will delete the selected history and clean up your browser. Now check whether you can able to use the sync feature without issues.

Solution 5: Uninstall and Reinstall Google Chrome

If none of the above solution works, you may have to uninstall Chrome from your computer and reinstall it.

• On Windows 10, open the Control Panel and select “Programs” to open the programs and features. Select Chrome from the list of the installed programs and click “Uninstall”.

• On Mac, go to “Applications” folder in Finder. Drag and drop Google Chrome app to the trash bin on your dock.

After deleting Chrome, download and install it afresh. It should mostly solve the sync problems.

Summary

When you use Chrome on multiple devices, the Chrome Sync feature allows you to synchronize browser data across all your devices. However, you may encounter different issues when synchronizing data in Chrome. We hope, one of the above solutions could help to resolve your sync issues.